1644. The war between Parliament and Crown has cost the people of Nantwich dearly, and tensions hang heavy as the summer heat over the streets. In this time of relative peace, long-buried hatreds have their chance to resurface, and while reluctant parliamentarian intelligencer, Daniel Cheswis, treasures these scant few days with his new bride, he knows they cannot last. For outside Daniel’s door, old debts, betrayals, and mistakes are already turning the people of Nantwich against one another, and there is one secret which has been buried longer than any other, a secret which it is Daniel’s lot to uncover. Why was a prominent landowner beaten to death seventy years ago, over the lease to Ridley Field? And what has his death to do with another murder, today, in that very field? Or with the strange engraving found amongst the new Mrs Cheswis’ belongings? When Daniel’s duty calls him once more, it is not only old hatreds which will be unearthed, but, in this time when gold feeds the furnaces of war, enough hoarded treasure to reignite bloody violence within Nantwich’s walls. **

1644. The smoke of parliamentary musket, cannon, and mortar fire is in the air around the royalist stronghold of Lathom House. Though guards still stand atop its walls, it is besieged on all sides, and it is only a matter of time until the house, along with its embittered and unwavering countess, Lady Charlotte de Tremouille, falls to Parliament’s might. Yet somehow, a royalist spy still creeps, unseen, through its gates, and brings the countess Parliament’s secrets. Barely recovered from the trials of the last few months, Daniel Cheswis is torn from his family and sent north, to uncover the identity of the traitor; though before he can even begin, Cheswis finds himself embroiled in a murder. A woman has been garrotted with cheese wire in her Chester home, suggesting there is more than just the usual hatreds of war at play. As lives are lost and coats are turned on both sides, Cheswis is tasked with finding the murderer, uncovering the traitor, and surviving his soldierly duty long enough to see Lathom House fall.